


Wrong Reyes

by rokhal



Category: All-New Ghost Rider (Comics), Blue Beetle (Comics), DCU (Comics), Ghost Rider (Comics), Marvel (Comics)
Genre: Action, Blink-and-you-miss-it Frank Castle cameo, Body Horror, Bodyswap, Canon Character of Color, Canon Disabled Character, Child Death (mention), Crack Crossover, Crossover, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Family, Fluff and Crack, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mistaken Identity, Pre-Reboot, Preboot, Psychopathology & Sociopathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-07 00:22:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17355413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rokhal/pseuds/rokhal
Summary: Jaime Reyes: just a normal high-schooler from El Paso who happens to have a set of homicidal alien battle armor embedded in his spine. His chief ambition: Become a dentist. (Hey, a dentist makes six figures a year.) His deepest fear: Letting the planet get destroyed, or his little sister messing up the DVR again; it depends on the week. Jaime Reyes is: The Blue Beetle.Robbie Reyes: just a normal mechanic from East LA who happens to be possessed by the ghost of a serial killer. His chief ambition: Move out of East LA. His deepest fear: Letting the ghost get loose, or running out of money for his brother's meds; it depends on the week. Robbie Reyes is: The Roast Rider.What do these young men have in common?As of this morning, everything.





	Wrong Reyes

**Author's Note:**

> Robbie Reyes is drawn from his solo runs, All-New Ghost Rider (2014) and Ghost Rider (2016).
> 
> Jaime Reyes is drawn from his first solo run, Blue Beetle (2006).
> 
> This grew out of a conversation with [soulofevil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/soulofevil/pseuds/soulofevil) and previous rants with [Fierysky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fierysky/pseuds/Fierysky) about how current Avengers writer Jason Aaron is writing Robbie Reyes. My theory is that Jason Aaron is trying to write Ghost Rider as if he were Blue Beetle. They do, after all, have a LOT in common, both being young Hispanic heavy-hitters possessed by potentially malevolent forces. But when you actually read their comics, it's obvious that the similarities are superficial and the differences are profound. They're both great characters and super enjoyable comics. Highly recommend.

Jaime Reyes woke slowly into darkness. He felt awful, his limbs were heavy, and his thoughts had the distinct dizzy muzziness of having been dragged straight out of deep sleep. There was a phone near his face, dee-dee-dee-ing an unfamiliar ringtone. He pawed at it and it fell off the nightstand and onto the floor. He reached for it and he fell off the bed in a tangle of sheets.

 _Swipe to accept,_ it read. He picked it up with a numb, shaking hand, and swiped.

“'Lo?” he grunted. His voice came out weird.

“Who is this?” a youthful voice on the other end demanded. Sounded like a kid his age, not one he'd recognized. Out-of-state accent.

“You called me, buddy,” Jaime replied, yawning. He struggled up and sat on the bed. The mattress felt weird. Thin, lumpy. He hadn't noticed it wearing out. “It's, like, super early, I'm gonna hang up now—”

“No-no-no-no-no! Do _not_ hang up!” the boy on the line growled. “Wake up. Notice anything weird?”

“Yeah, I'm getting a call from a stranger at, like, five in the morning, I don't have to get up for another hour—”

“Look on the night stand. You should see a pair of bluetooth headphones. Those are mine.”

“What the he—ck, I didn't take anything from you.” Jaime fumbled around by the light of the cell phone, and began to grow alarmed. That little filing cabinet by the bed wasn't his nightstand. That wasn't his lamp sitting on it. And when he turned the lamp on, the room certainly wasn't his. It was cleaner, for one thing. Battered furniture and an overflowing hamper, but no shelves, no posters. Just a cushy pair of bluetooth headphones. “Okay, this ain't funny. Where am I?”

“Do you see the headphones?” the boy demanded.

“Yeah—nice—wait, are these Chinese knockoff Beats?”

“They sound fine. That's not the point. Those are my headphones, that's my room, and I'm willing to bet you're _in my body,_ ” the voice continued.

“What the hell,” Jaime said flatly. _Scarab? What's he talking about?_

“I think I'm in yours. Am I calling from your phone number?”

Jaime checked the screen. Unknown Number, and then an El Paso area code. That could be his phone number.

“You got brown eyes, longish hair, scruffy beard? Messy room? Sister?”

 _Escarabajo! Digame!_ “What are you doing with my family?” Jaime demanded. His voice came out stronger, rougher than it should have. “If you dare do _anything_ to them—”

“Eating breakfast,” the boy using Jaime's phone replied. “Please. Wake up. Go to the bathroom. Open the medicine cabinet. You have to give my brother his meds and get him to school. _Read the labels,_ if you don't read the goddamn labels I swear to God I'm going to—please, read the labels carefully and then get just his morning pills and put them in the little plastic Batman cup and put it next to his breakfast. He knows what to do. Make him cold cereal and get him on the bus. Then sit tight, skip school, call in sick to Canelo's Auto and Body. Pick Gabe up when the bus gets back and make dinner. Watch some cartoons, give him his evening pills, have him go to bed. Don't leave the house. Don't touch the car. I'm coming to you.”

Faintly, in the background noise across the line, Jaime heard his mother. _“Jaime, con quien estas hablando?”_

“Mama! That's my mom, let me talk to her!” Jaime demanded.

“Es un amigo de la escuela,” the boy said, muffled. “Tenemos un proyecto.”

“ _Un proyecto con pastillas? Jaime, you know you don't have to hide things from me.”_

“Uuuuh, got to go, I'm gonna be late,” the boy said.

“Mom!” Jaime yelled. “Mama! That's not me!”

“Be quiet and do it,” the boy in Jaime's body demanded. “Please.”

“ _Jaime, what's up with you today?”_

And then he hung up. Jaime redialed and it went to voicemail.

He stood up and padded out the door of the strange room.

It was a drab little place, smelling of canned pasta sauce and must, with peeling paint on the walls and scuffed floorboards. The room opened into a small hallway. To the left, at the end of the hallway, was a closed door plastered in stickers. _Gabe's,_ a sign written in marker read. _~~Stay Out~~._ Just ahead of him was a bathroom, the door cracked open, a nightlight shining within. He crept in, the floor creaking under his bare feet as he passed from hardwood to worn linoleum. He flicked on the light, and, wow, that was _not_ him.

The guy in the mirror—not kid, he wasn't that much older than Jaime but it was enough—was wiry like Jaime but had muscle packed on that only two or three years past puberty could give. Where Jaime had chin scraggle, this guy had a goatee. He wore black plugs in his earlobes; Jaime reached up and touched them: big holes, in his body. A scar cut through one eyebrow, and there were more scars, deliberate, slanting, symmetrical scars, on his forehead and scalp. He looked tough. Jaime looked himself in the eyes and flinched at the scowl he saw there. He tried to relax his face, and looked again, stared. The guy's eyes didn't match. Left eye: green. Nice, normal—actually, awesome, really striking against his copper skin, making Jaime wonder if Traci would like it if he started wearing green contacts. Right eye, though: weird orange color that he'd never seen on a human. He leaned forward, shut his left eye to stare into the mirror. Pale brown iris, practically yellow, shot through with fine red blood vessels. Not a contact lens. Maybe the guy was born with different-colored eyes and this one got injured.

He saw a spark of light deep in the pupil and jerked back.

_Escarabajo, that you?_

There was a presence in the back of his head, like someone breathing in his ear. But he couldn't feel the scarab. He felt back between his shoulder-blades to be sure—no bumps. Nothing. Of course Jaime didn't have the Scarab anymore; it was welded to his own body. It must be just his imagination.

Now this other guy had the Scarab.

_No way I'm telling him about that. Hopefully the alien killing machine'll have the sense to lie low until I get back in there. Somehow._

The phone rang again, that unfamiliar bee-dee-dee-dee, and Jaime jumped. The face in the mirror scowled again, reflexively. He turned away as he got the phone out, then turned back again, uneasy as though the guy's reflection could reach out and grab him when he wasn't looking at it. It was his own phone calling again. “Don't hang up like that!” Jaime answered.

“Do you hear a voice in your head?” the guy demanded.

 _Oh no,_ Jaime thought. _Scarab, can't you tell that's not me?_ “Uh...”

“Since you woke up, have you heard anyone talking to you?”

“What? No,” Jaime said. “What's this about?”

“Thank god. Sometimes there's a voice in my head. Don't listen to it. I have schizophrenia.”

“What the heck,” Jaime exclaimed. He opened the medicine cabinet, found a row of pill bottles. “Dude. Which of these meds are yours? You're supposed to take them.”

“No! No! All those pills are Gabe's. Ignore the voice in your head, no matter what he says. Sit tight 'til I get there.”

“Where is here?”

“East L.A. It's a shithole. Don't go outside.”

“Los Angeles? That's like hundreds of miles from El Paso. How are you getting here? I don't think Paco's car is up to that kind of trip.”

The guy in Jaime's body hung up again. Jaime gripped the phone and wished he could remember his mom's cell number. But it was, of course, saved in his own goddamn phone. Which this mystery guy had.

He went back to the guy's room and changed out of his boxer shorts, put on new ones. Did not pause admire the guy's dick for more than thirty seconds. Put on the guy's pants, which were helpfully piled on the floor next to the dresser, with keys and wallet in the pockets. Checked the ID: Roberto Reyes, nineteen years old, Los Angeles, California. Interesting coincidence, but it was a common last name. Maybe they were second cousins and some magical macguffin was going around switching distant relatives' bodies.

While looking for socks, he found a roll of hundred-dollar bills in a rubber band.

Jaime suddenly recalled the statistic that every hundred-dollar bill used in the United States had cocaine residue on it.

Maybe this schizophrenic guy with the sick brother sold paintings for cash.

Yeah, maybe.

The phone beeped again, but this time it was an alarm.

He heard a rustling and a buzzing noise from down the hall, and looked out to see a skinny green-eyed kid rolling down in a motorized wheelchair. Jaime ducked back around the doorframe, unable to deal with this on top of everything else. _That_ was the little brother he had to give meds to? The kid was older than his sister Milagro. He was thinner than he should be, huge eyes. “Robbie-Robbie!” the kid called, sing-song, and he sounded young. Younger than Milagro. “Are you hiding?”

“Yeah,” Jaime said, licking his lips. “You found me. Great job. Gabe.”

“It wasn't hard,” the kid, Gabe, said. “I'm not a baby. You can make it harder.”

Jaime steeled himself. _Okay. Be nice and fun for the special-needs kid. You can do this._ “You're right. Next time I'll make it harder. You, uh, want breakfast?”

“Yeah! And then meds, and then brush our teeth, and then school!” Gabe exclaimed, wheeling his way right to the door of the room. The way he moved was different—a touch uncoordinated. His eyes, too. He didn't meet Jaime's eyes for longer than a second. It made it look like he wasn't interested or paying attention to him, but by his words, he definitely was.

 _Okay, Jaime,_ he told himself. _Just because he moves different than you, and talks different, and doesn't make eye contact right, doesn't mean he doesn't have feelings. Don't patronize him. DON'T MAKE THIS AWKWARD._

He poured himself and the kid a bowl of Fruit Loops. Read five different medication labels, double-checked them, sorted out the morning and twice-a-day ones from the evening ones, and loaded up Gabe's Batman cup. Gabe took the pills one at a time, showing him his open mouth after each pill. “Juice, please,” he said at the end. Then Jaime had to open Robbie's sad refrigerator and pour him juice. He poured it into the Batman cup. “You're silly,” Gabe said. Apparently the Batman cup wasn't for juice. But Gabe drank the juice, they brushed their teeth together over the sink, and Jaime escorted him out the door for the short bus to pick him and his wheelchair up.

“Bye, Robbie!” Gabe hollered as the lift carried him into the bus.

“Bye, Gabe!” Jaime said, waving back.

And then Jaime was alone, standing on the edge of a sidewalk in front of a dingy apartment building with bars over every single window. He looked down and saw a brass cartridge-casing in the gutter.

“Nope. Nope, nope, nope,” he muttered, and hurried back indoors. “Nope.” He momentarily forgot which apartment he'd come out of, tried the wrong door, got sworn at for rattling the knob, and retreated back into the correct apartment to sit on Robbie's worn-out couch. He explored the place. Looked for photos—nothing. Looked for mementos—comic books, action figures, crayon drawings on the refrigerator. Car manuals—hey, a spot of familiarity. A CRT TV, the kind you could pick up on the side of the road. An old Playstation hooked up to it. Kid stuff, car stuff.

**Quién eres tu?**

Jaime whipped his head up, stared around. That was a voice, a faint human voice. He checked the TV—no power. He didn't see a radio anywhere, and the voice hadn't come from his phone. _Oh, shit,_ he thought. This was Robbie's untreated schizophrenia. He hummed to himself, and looked for the TV remote.

 **N** **o! No!** **Escúchame. Ayúdame. Help. Can you hear me?**

“Not listening to someone else's auditory hallucinations,” Jaime muttered.

**You can hear me! Gracias a Dios. Please. Help me!**

Jaime put the TV on. Cartoons.

**No. No! I'm not a hallucination! I'm real!**

Jaime burst into hysterical chuckles. “That's exactly what a hallucination would say. Wow. I'm living the tropes. All the tropes.”

 **I'm Robbie Reyes!** the voice in his head protested. **This is my body! That guy on the phone, that's not me, he just told you I'm schizophrenic so you wouldn't listen to me. He was lying! He's been possessing my body all year, trying to erase me. It's taking all my strength just to talk to you!**

Jaime muted the TV, closed his eyes. Focused on his breathing. Focused on the presence in the back of his head. Back in his own body, the Scarab made a high-pitched hum all through him, electrical and curious, not a physical sensation, but demonstrably real. This presence felt just as real, and there was a distinctly human warmth to it. “Go on,” Jaime said cautiously.

**He's the evil ghost of this badass serial killer who terrorized the whole city in the nineties. Killed people all over the country. Guy was a fucking dangerous animal. I was fixing up this car that used to belong to him, and cut myself, and next thing I know, I'm just a passenger. He stole my body. He's ruining my life, and he's ruining other people's lives. And what's worse—he's changed my body. He gave it powers, and he wants to use them to kill people. I can barely stop him. He's been riding around terrorizing people every night ever since, and I'm standing on the brake pedal, but I'm getting weaker and weaker. Someday soon I won't be able to stop him from killing. And then his reign of terror will start again.**

**Thank god you're here. Gracias a Dios. I thought I was doomed to fade away, but now you're here, and he's over there, maybe we can stop him.**

“He's got powers?” Jaime asked warily.

**La Leyenda. Roast Rider. Robot Racer. Look it up.**

Jaime did some Googling and landed himself a dark shaky cell phone video of a burning robot in a black jumpsuit flinging a rope or something through the air like a lasso, capturing a screaming man, and then hurling him away off-screen. Then the robot pulled out a crowbar from nowhere and started beating another guy in the back and legs. The audio was full of screaming and cursing, and a strange rumble and whine. Robot Racer wasn't a keyword Jaime would have come up with in his subconscious; it couldn't be coincidence that it corresponded with actual footage of a dangerous metahuman. He was starting to believe the hallucination. He ground his teeth at the casual cruelty of the person who'd called him on the phone. “That's you?”

**That's us. Me, and that demon. That's what he does.**

“That's what's home with my family right now?” Jaime shrilled.

**No, no. See, he attached his powers to my body. This body. And he's coming here to jump back into me. But after—who knows.**

Jaime got a brain wave and looked up auto shops in El Paso. Found the number for his dad's garage and left three different panicked voicemails about the serial killer wearing his skin.

 **He won't leave Los Angeles for now,** Robbie continued. **But when I finally lose control of him, who knows what he'll do? I know he'll start killing. But he might stop taking care of my brother for me, too. Go on a road trip. See your folks.**

“No,” Jaime snarled. He wiped tears from his eyes and stalked around the room, missing the buzz of the Scarab on the edge of his awareness, the power, the safety it could give him. “No. Robbie, we're gonna stop this guy. You say we've got power, I say we use it. We're gonna send this ghost back to hell and get you your life back.”

**It won't be easy. It could ruin your life, too.**

“Doesn't have to be easy or fun, Robbie. You're not alone anymore. Tell me what to do.”

**I hate to ask this of you.**

“I can't leave an innocent person suffering like this, Robbie. It's not right. How do I help?”

**You have to help me kill him. Kill Eli Morrow.**

 

* * *

 

Robbie Reyes had woken, fully rested, at six in the morning Mountain Time, eight-hundred miles from Gabe and in a strange body. A man, a woman, and a little girl lived in the house. The man walked with a cane, and he made breakfast tacos for everyone. The little girl was adorable. When Robbie told her so, she looked at him like he'd grown a second head.

“Jaime, is everything alright?” the man asked, as Robbie prepared to “leave for school.” He had a bag full of books that he planned to ditch somewhere down the block, and a multitool and a wire coat-hanger that he actually needed. Also, shamefully, one of the man's credit cards. The man put his hand on Robbie's shoulder and Robbie stared at it. He had to force himself to remember that it was okay. The man wasn't trying to comfort him because he thought he was broken or weak. He just thought Robbie was his kid. The man took his hand away and made a weird waving gesture over his face. “Is it something with your—bug thing?”

Robbie reached up to touch his hair. Jaime Reyes' hair. Shit, did the kid have lice? He didn't itch. Except suddenly he did, crawling and tingling all over his scalp and spine. Gross. He just had to get back to LA and fix this, somehow, then it wouldn't be his problem. “No, sir. I'm fine.”

“You know we're always there for you, hijo. Whatever you need.” He patted Robbie on the shoulder again, and Robbie half-wanted him to keep doing it and half-wanted to slap him away. “Oh, and I know I get on you about your grammar—but you don't need to be ashamed you're from Texas. Come on. Talk normal.”

Robbie smiled tensely. “Mm-hm.”

“Have a good day at school, son.”

“Mm-hm!”

He hunched under Jaime's heavy backpack and headed out the door, intending to wander off down the street until he spotted a model of car whose electrical system he'd worked on before. But the bus pulled up before he'd gotten halfway down the block, and Mr. Reyes was standing in the front doorway watching him, and Robbie couldn't do anything suspicious in front of him. He was watching him too close. Like a really strict foster parent, only he actually seemed to like kids.

Robbie got on the bus, crept between benches full of strangers until he found an unoccupied seat. God, he hadn't missed this.

He stared across the kid next to him and out the window. El Paso was a nice-looking town. Not scary-nice, just, clean. Recently painted houses. Little yards of neatly-kept desert trees and cleanly raked gravel. A distinct lack of razor-wire on the bill-boards. They looked friendlier without the razor wire. Made him want to go to Carl's Junior, or file a personal injury lawsuit.

The bus let him off in front of a big brick building with lots of windows. Robbie headed out and slipped around the back of the bus. Made for the fence.

“Hey! Jaime!” a guy yelled from off to the side of him. “Jaime!” he repeated, and Robbie had a brain-wave and remembered that that was supposed to be his name. He turned and looked.

A huge muscle-bound kid in a baggy T-shirt was storming toward him. Robbie froze, spun, and speed-walked through the parking lot, trying to lose the cholo between cars. He was not in the mood to get his head kicked in. His...his host's head kicked in. God, this was weird.

“Jaime, hold up! Whatcha running for, guey?” The other guy wasn't giving up, was picking up speed. He had fists like sledgehammers, tattoos on his forearms.

Not good. Robbie dumped open the backpack, grabbed the coat-hanger, and broke into a sprint. Timed the traffic and ran across the street, into a residential area. Zig-zagged back and forth through side-streets and garbage alleys until he'd lost the guy among the houses. Checked over his shoulder a couple more times, and let himself breathe. There was a weird hissing noise in his ear, like a cicada. He shook his head hard until the noise stopped. Lice, and an ear infection. Great.

He'd never stolen a car, but he'd known kids who did, and any idiot knew you had to pick your location.

He jogged through the neighborhood until he came to a doctor's office. There was a camera in the corner, trained on the lot, but more importantly, there was a late-model Toyota Camry whose ignition lock he could bypass in his sleep. People stayed in doctors' offices for an hour at a time, left at regular intervals. It was seven-forty-five now; no one should be leaving yet. He got out the multitool and straightened the coathanger into a crude slim-jim, popped the door, and took his time bypassing the antitheft sensors so he could hotwire it. He'd hotwired dozens of cars, but only ever in the garage, to help diagnose a car that failed to start or to get one moving when the ignition switch couldn't be used. Grand theft auto meant jail time. Even if it could get him a desperately-needed grand or two—it'd never been worth the risk.

“Sorry, Jaime,” he muttered, looking up into the security camera. He stripped the ignition circuit wires and started the car. “Hang on, Gabe. Be back before you know it.”

 

* * *

 

Jaime paced back and forth in Robbie's bare living room. Or maybe—Robbie had been enslaved for a whole year. Maybe it was Eli's bare living room, and Eli had pawned all Robbie's stuff. He couldn't imagine how horrible that must be, trapped in his own body while a homicidal intelligence piloted it around—come to think of it, that was exactly what he'd escaped by a hairs-breadth with the Scarab. He'd been so lucky it was damaged and couldn't take him over. So lucky it had come around to his way of thinking, mostly.

Horrible though Eli was, Jaime didn't think he could kill him.

**You have to.**

“But he's in my body, Robbie! Where am I supposed to go?”

**You haven't lived with him in your head for a year. I can't put it into words how horrifying that man is—that ghost is. He's a cancer on this city. He's a ticking time bomb. Kill him while we have the chance. It's for the greater good.**

“But—”

**You'll just have to share mine. We'll split it. 70-30. I'll let you have it on weekends and holidays. I know it doesn't seem like much, but think of the lives we'll save by getting rid of him.**

“But my life—my friends, my family—”

**Jaime, some people go their entire lives never seeing their one chance to make a difference in this world. This is yours.**

“You forgive me if I'm not going to jump on this right away. I mean, there's got to be a way to get rid of him without killing anyone! And I'm not just saying that because it's my body. He's a ghost! There's got to be, like, exorcisms!”

**How do you think he found me in the first place? He was a wandering spirit. He jumped in. We expel him, and he'll be back, he'll do what he did to some other innocent victim, or he'll come back for me, reclaim his power. He _has_ to die. Knowing he's out there, invisible, ready to strike at any time—I couldn't live like that.**

“I'll think about it.” Jaime picked up the TV remote and started channel-surfing. Robbie only got, like, ten channels.

**What's that supposed to mean?**

“It means _I'll think about it,_ ” Jaime ground out. “Dios mio, you're asking me to kill a person who's also me. It's a lot to think about.” He needed his own phone, or the Scarab. He needed to talk to his friends, his mom and dad—but what would he say? He was in the wrong body and a voice in his head—not the usual one—wanted him to kill someone—not for the usual reasons—and he might be coming home for the holidays with piercings and short hair and dropping out of school, but it was going to be fine, because the guy who was going to get 70% of his life had already finished high school and worked at an auto shop. He found a football game. Minnesota vs Ohio. He bounced back and forth between that and a daytime rerun of Frasier. At noon, he got up and made himself a sort of hash out of some ground meat and cabbage from the refrigerator. Robbie—or Eli—had hardly any ingredients for anything worth eating. Lots of canned soup, packaged taco seasoning, and Hamburger Helper.

As he ate his cabbage hash, Jaime had a horrible thought and he got Robbie's phone out again. Searched Google News.

**Blue Beetle? What's that?**

“Oh, no,” Jaime said, tapping on a video. “Oh, no, no, no. Robbie, this is bad.”

The video was from an Arizona news station, dash-cam footage from a traffic stop. An officer approached an unfamiliar sedan, made a slim teenager get out and spread his hands against the hood. Jaime recognized his own face, but not his body language—with Eli Morrow wearing him, Jaime's shoulders hunched and his face looked closed-off, defiant. The cop made Eli-as-Jaime get down on the ground. Put a knee on the small of his back. And then—the dash-cam didn't capture detail or color that well, but Jaime could fill in the blanks. Electric arcs, a strange musky smell like an angry anthill, and then hot blue-and-black splashes of high-tech alloy splotching and wrapping all over Jaime's body, burning through clothes, eating away skin, covering him and sealing him inside the Blue Beetle armor. The Scarab rearing out from his back, expanding to wrap half-way around his torso, its horns extending above his head from behind his shoulders. Eli looked like he was screaming as the blue carapace flowed over his face. Served him right. Except now Eli Morrow was the Beetle. Jaime chewed his fingernails as he watched the Beetle sweep one hand back, grab the cop by the ankle and swing him like a sledgehammer against the door of the sedan to slump to the ground, motionless. Watched the armor ripple as it morphed Jaime's arm into a deadly ray canon. “No, no, no.”

 **What in the hell is that?** Robbie asked slowly.

“No, Escarabajo, don't let him kill him, no—”

The cannon stopped halfway out of the Beetle's arm, folded itself back down and disappeared. “Gracias. Bueno. Bueno. Escarabajo, lo hiciste bien.”

**What in the hell.**

The Beetle—Eli—shook his hand out. Then he looked down at himself, patted all his skin. Formed claws from his fingertips and scratched at his chest, his face, trying and failing to pry the armor off. Stuck his tongue out through the skin-clinging flexible lips of the armor. Tried and failed to fit himself back into the sedan—the horns were in the way. Then he looked down the freeway, fists clenched at his sides, and jumped, hundreds of feet into the air, disappearing from view.

**I repeat. Jaime. What the hell did I just watch.**

“Blue Beetle,” Jaime said softly, taking Robbie's fingernails out of his mouth. “He's a superhero in El Paso. Alien battle armor. Used to be me. And now...it's Eli Morrow.”

 **And he's gonna be here a little ahead of schedule, with that seven-league-boots act he does,** Robbie guessed.

“Try _a lot_ ahead of schedule,” Jaime corrected. “The armor flies.”

**Then you've got to make up your mind, amigo. Kill him—and you get to live a pretty good fraction of your life, Gabe gets his big brother back, and Eli Morrow goes to hell where he belongs. Let him live—and you'll see what Eli does when he figures out how to use that thing. And I'm telling you, it won't be pretty.**

“I can't say I'll kill him,” Jaime said. “But—I'm not finished, Robbie. C'mon. I don't kill people. But I will help you fight him.”

**Excellent! Get to my car. Let's get you revved up.**

 

* * *

 

 

Robbie shot through the air like a human cannonball, wind whistling past where his ears should be, humming against the hard jointed plates that had replaced his skin. The only part of him that was still human, that he could touch, was his tongue and teeth. His legs were twice their normal length, feet elongated into clawed springs like a grasshopper. Every time he touched down on the desert, they sprang out, and he shot forward again at two hundred miles an hour through the air, rocking his brain in his skull. Jaime Reyes owed him a hell of an explanation. He could've told Robbie beforehand. Maybe not every little detail, but at the very least a line of bull like Robbie'd given him: “I get panic attacks and violently lash out at people who touch me from behind,” maybe. “I have special forces combat training, don't get scared or my reflexes activate.”

Well, Robbie hadn't known that, and now he was a blue-and-black robot monster with plastic-metal for skin, and limbs that could turn into guns, or other types of limbs. It'd hurt like hell for a couple seconds, and he'd almost vaporized a highway cop before he'd stopped freaking out.

Robbie acknowledged that he seemed to be making very good time. Much better than he'd made by keeping to the speed limit in a stolen car. He'd crossed most of Arizona and he wasn't tired yet.

Ѫթք ↂ ≈Ꝏζ, went the buzz in his head.

Oh, yes—he had a voice in his head again. What he'd thought was an ear infection was actually this hard blue shell trying to communicate. This voice, in contrast to the voice he'd gotten used to, was incapable of mocking him, lying to him, or blackmailing him, and it seemed to be trying to be helpful. “I can't understand anything you're saying,” Robbie said, slowly and distinctly, as he hurtled over the stony hills and little desert towns. He spotted a sign on the freeway ahead of him as he reached the apex of his current leap. “Can you zoom in on that exit sign, please.”

ՎϛϭϮϯϿ, buzzed the armor. His vision went blue and a little round magnification spot opened in it, right over the freeway sign.

_Yuma, next exit. San Diego, 157 miles._

“Thanks. Normal vision, please.”

They touched down, bounded forward again. Six hundred miles down, roughly two hundred miles to go.

Just keep going. Get to LA. Get Jaime to tell him how to power down. Supervise Jaime pretending to be Robbie in front of Gabe. Call Amadeus Cho or someone and see if he could shake down any answers about this mind-switch situation. And then...lie down in his bed, in Jaime's body, shut his eyes, and listen to the silence for a few hours.

Պժϡքϛ ՌԻ Ѫ ϭϮՊϯՃϞ, ϕ.

Okay, listen to the syllabic static in Jaime's head. Better than listening to Eli.

 

* * *

 

“Cool,” Jaime said, as he ventured across the brass-and-needle-strewn street to where Robbie's car was parked. Robbie drove a big black muscle car with a belt-driven blower sticking out of the hood, like Mad Max.

**Cool? Seriously, that's it? This is...this is a '69 Charger with a 5.7 liter small-block V8, supercharged, nine-hundred horsepower, racing cams, alloy wheels, disk brakes—**

“Yeah, that all...sounds cool. I guess. If you're big into customization. But Dad says custom builds are unreliable—”

Jaime felt a sharp, sudden jerk in his head. Like someone had yanked open a door and rushed out of a room, leaving the air swirling behind them.

“Sorry,” he said. He got Robbie's keys out of his pocket and unlocked the driver's door. The interior was also custom. Factory bench seat in the back, leather bucket seats in the front. Nothing super new; probably last updated in the nineties, just judging by the texture and weathering. Very clean. Weird smell, like brimstone.

He sat down. His back molded right into the bucket seat and for an unsettling moment, he felt his senses spreading all through the car, feeling the sun on its paint, seeing behind and in front of him—not reflections in the mirrors, but seeing _out through_ the mirrors. It was almost like being back in the Beetle armor, but even less intuitive. “Freaky,” he said. He started the car. It was a lot like Paco's Skylark: everything big and stiff and heavy, from the ignition switch to the pedals, solid and satisfying to use. The engine had a nice throaty vintage rumble, but the supercharger, even from inside the car, set up a continuous eerie hiss. He revved the engine experimentally and the V8 roared, RPMs climbing all the way to the top of the gauge on what Jaime thought was a moderate pulse of the gas pedal. The supercharger's hiss became a rising and falling shriek. His heart raced and he didn't know why.

“Breathe,” he told himself. He put his hands on the wheel, and that strange sensation of _being the car_ returned: he could feel the skin of his palms like he was holding hands with himself; he closed his eyes, but he knew the color and direction of a passing car as it passed across the car's mirrors; as he concentrated on drawing slow, even breaths, he was aware of the blower's intake valves flipping open and shut. The engine chugged and hissed away at idle. Jaime got the impression that he was standing next to a nervous guy tapping his feet and clenching his fists; the car was antsy. It wanted to _do something,_ preferably fast and violently, and it was making Jaime antsy, too. “Robbie, I'm not sure about this.”

**About what?**

“I don't want to wreck your car.”

**Heh-heh. Thanks for your concern. If you're worried about it, I'll drive.**

“You can do that? You sounded so weak this morning,” Jaime said, squinting. Come to think of it, Robbie sounded a lot different in the few hours he'd known him: more cheerful, more assertive. More...Midwestern.

**Oh, yes. Gracias a Dios. With that pendejo Eli Morrow gone, my strength is coming back. It's how he kept me from taking my body back, see—he kept bleeding me, constantly. But now, I think I'm strong enough to help you fight him. And not a moment too soon, if this alien death machine he's piloting is as powerful as you say.**

“It is. It's built to annihilate whole civilizations. It's got ray guns, it's got knives, it's got shields, it can fly, it can punch in and out of the space-time continuum—everything it has is designed to be lethal. Even now, I constantly have to tell it to tone things down! It's incredibly dangerous, and if I had any of my usual contacts here, I'd be calling every super I know.”

**How long did it take you to figure out how to use it?**

“Not long. I told you, the hard part is _stopping_ it.”

**Hm. Tell me. The Beetle, it's just armor. Right? You're still flesh and blood under there?**

Jaime shuddered. “Yeah. Sometimes I get the feeling it'd rather just replace me—yeah, I'm still me, mostly. It has to grow back my skin every time I shut it down, but that's all.”

**And it's powered by this...bug thing, in your back.**

“Yeah.”

**Can it be removed?**

“Yeah,” with a strong probability of spinal damage and hemorrhaging. Jaime hugged Robbie's arms to his chest. “I'd rather it not come to that—”

 **It might have to,** Robbie replied. **But this is good, good info. I think we can beat him.**

“How?”

**See, when this body becomes the Roast Rider—we're not flesh and blood. We're something else.**

Jaime was not looking forward to this. “What exactly are you—we, then?”

**Fire, fury, and thirty-eight hundred pounds of Detroit steel. We're gonna kick his blue alien ass, you'll see.**

 

* * *

 

The sun was starting to tilt westward as Robbie bounded from mountain to mountain through the national forest north of San Diego. The armor had sprouted little airfoils on his arms to help guide his descent, six-inch wide fins, and at the speed he was hurling himself along, they caught so much air they might as well be wings. He sprang up a thousand feet in the air, peered around for a spot of ground that wasn't closed in by pine trees, twisted his forearms to glide for it, touched down on the springy legs the suit had made, and then jumped away again. He crushed a dead tree into powder. Scared some mule deer. Scared some campers. At last, the mountains ran out and the vast valley of the Los Angeles Metroplex sprawled out before him, and then he had to slow down. Bounce more vertically, gaze down, try to map the city out in his head. From above, LA was a great gray-brown grid of ranch houses and industrial buildings, accented by green sports-fields and blue swimming pools. The freeways were his best landmark. One freeway looked much like another, but at the crest of each jump he could look down and see which ones connected to which, and read the street signs. He identified the East LA/Boyle Heights area and bounced toward it, a series of lower, lighter hops. He almost got one elongated grasshopper leg stuck in a roof when he punched a hole in it. After that, he switched to the roads, dodging traffic and scaring pedestrians.

“I'm looking for signs that say Hillrock Lane,” Robbie told the armor as they rose into the air again. “That's H-I-L-L—”

ζ ֏ջϔ! The armor changed his vision again, lighting up with a whole row of little magnification spots all up and down a two-lane road in East LA.

They bounded over to it, and then—there! That was Robbie's apartment building. He could see the bars on the windows, he could see the Charger parked out front. Two air conditioners on the roof, one broken. He'd never been so happy to see the place.

As he spread his arms to slow his descent, suddenly his vision went filmy blue and started crawling with alien symbols.

ↈ! Ճ փ ₪ՊԺ . Ϡ ϞϕՌ ԻѪ! ↈ!!!

“What?” Robbie demanded. He braced for impact, but there was a weird whirring sensation around his toes, and the long bounding legs contracted back down and turned into...rocket boots. That would have been handy four hours ago. He stopped descending, and began to float away against his will. “What are you doing! That's where I live! Put me down!”

ↈ! ԻѪ ՎϛϭϮ ϯ Ͽ҂Ѧ ϠԲԴ. Ճփ₪ / ՊժϡϞϕ : ՌԻ ϡϞϕՌԻѪ. ↈ Ͽ҂Ѧ?

“I still can't understand what you're saying.” The armor was carrying him higher, farther. “I want to go home. My brother needs me, I need to get this stuff off and get back to my life. Okay?”

The alien symbols in his vision swirled up and down, faster as they floated higher and higher over the city. Then sparkly yellow swooshes appeared, parallel streaks of fire overlying some of the streets. A symbol, a big flashing yellow ↈ, appeared right over the Charger.

“Tire tracks,” Robbie realized. “My tire tracks. You can see them? You can—never mind. It's normal, okay? Whatever weird thing you're picking up, get used to it.”

ↈ! the armor protested.

“Put me down.”

Ꝏ?

“Please put me down.”

The armor gave a nervous Ꝏ and throttled the thrust to the rocket boots. Robbie began a wavering, reluctant descent to Hillrock Lane. He hoped no one he knew was watching.

He was twenty feet above the ground when the yellow ↈ over the Charger lit up and the armor started shrieking Ͽ҂Ѧ! Ͽ҂Ѧ! Ͽ҂Ѧ! over and over in his ear. The steel skin around his shoulder whirred and a bulge of metal plates rippled down his arm, sealing down his fingers, expanding to the size of a football, bigger, a car tire, a huge blue fusiform mass of metal and tubes at the end of his arm, and he sensed canisters filling, capacitors charging, emitters opening. He struggled to turn his arm away, but the armor around his shoulder resisted him, and the rocket boots rotated him back on target. Robbie gripped his own elbow with his free hand, tugging.

Ճ փ ₪ՊԺ : ϡϞϕՌԻѪ! Ͽ҂Ѧ ↈ.

“No. No. Do not fire that. We are not wrecking my neighborhod. If you vaporize that car, you'll kill your host! You'll kill Jaime Reyes.”

ԲփϛՀ, the armor crackled. Ϟ փ ₪ՊԺ ϕ?

“Just! Land!” Robbie snarled. The space-ray cannon whirred some more, reabsorbing back into his arm.

Then the Charger roared to life below him, fire jetting up out of every light and airpipe, and the Rider leapt into the air out of the metal of the roof, howling engine noise and bashing him in the face with a blazing chain wrapped around one leather fist.

Robbie had never had the chance to appreciate how terrifying the Rider was up close: the expressionless steel skull, the fiery void behind the eyes, the hydrocarbon smell, the heat like a hard-running engine, the slick, unnaturally fast movements. The human teeth, so eerie between the chrome plates that made up its face. It smashed him again and again with a desperate fury. They crashed down to the pavement.

Ͽ҂Ѧ! Ͽ҂Ѧ! Ͽ҂Ѧ! the armor shrieked. The Rider's blows dented right through the thin plates over Robbie's face. His vision swam and he spat blood. Ճ փ ₪ՊԺ : ϗϧϚՀϡՃϞѦ!

“You were right.” He lashed out, one arm forming into a great gleaming scythe that cut open the Rider's chest as he flung it away. The Rider's leather jumpsuit parted for half a second as it staggered to its feet, revealing fire and bone within.

Jaime. Poor kid.

ԲփϛՀ ϔϧϛ, ϯ ϭ₪! Ճ փ ₪ՊԺ : ϗϧϚՀϡՃϞѦ!

“You still in there, Jaime?” Robbie demanded, feeling inidentifiable weapons bristling out of the armor's back. Both his arms ended in huge knives right now, and he had the feeling he was going to need them.

“ **Guess again,** ” the Rider growled back. Its leather skin stitched itself back up, closing the fire in again as it shook out its chain and whirled it over the street.

 _Eli._ Robbie shoved himself to his feet and raised his knives. “You _motherfucker_.”

 

* * *

 

“So how do we do this?” Jaime asked the voice in his head an hour or two before Jaime's body arrived in Hillrock Heights. “How do we, uh, power-up?”

 **It's easy,** Robbie said. **Concentrate. Think about everything that's gone wrong in your life, everybody who's disrespected you, frustrated you, put you down. All your anger and hatred. And then you wish for the fire.**

“I'm, uh, I'm pretty even-tempered, actually,” Jaime said. “I mean, I get scared a lot. Who wouldn't.”

**C'mon. Nobody's ever stolen something of yours? Taken credit for your accomplishments? Cheated you, bullied you, ratted you out? Work with me, here.**

“Maybe?” Jaime said. “I guess—I used to hate this guy, Luis. He was mixed up in some gang stuff and got my Dad shot. But then I forgave him. So.”

**Well, _un-_ forgive him! Hatred fuels the fires! You want Eli Morrow terrorizing the planet in your space-suit?**

Jaime took a deep breath, feeling that weird echo coming through the blower. “Okay. This kinda goes against everything anybody ever told me...here goes.” And he shut his eyes and concentrated.

 **That's weak,** Robbie said after a minute. **Wow. Maybe...try panic. Panic works, too.**

Jaime took deep, quick breaths.

**What are you doing?**

“Hyperventillating.”

**No. Look. Okay, your family. Eli's coming here, to get his power back. But he woke up in your bed. Your mother, I heard her on the phone. You got any brothers or sisters?**

“A sister. Younger.”

**Good, good. Do you know what he likes to do with little girls?**

“I think you're gonna tell me.”

 **He likes to gut them while they're still alive,** Robbie said coldly. **Video-tape them. Mutilate their little faces. He used to save the entrails in a cooler, take them out to the desert, lay out the heart and intestines on a natural altar—**

“Madre de Dios!”

**Good, you're panicking. Keep panicking. I'm gonna help you get the fire going.**

“What's wrong with people, why would anyone _do_ that?” Jaime shrilled.

 **Reasons.** Something stirred at the base of Jaime's chest, under his stomach. He smelled engine exhaust from somewhere. His bones hurt, and his breath came fast and steaming. **Don't you dare fight me, now. Let me do this, so we can kill that bastard for your little sister.**

“Aaaaaow,” Jaime moaned.

**Oh, yeah—it's gonna hurt like nothing you've ever felt in your life.**

“You'd be surprised,” Jaime grunted. “Just do it.”

The heat flared in earnest, and all of a sudden it wasn't aching, it was agony: skin burning away like the bug-suit did to him, but no pain-killers, no endorphins to ease it, and deep, so deep: his eyes, his throat, his guts, his lungs. His bones cracked with the heat, and he could see nothing but steam and smoke, his shriveling nostrils full of the gasoline-and-barbecue smell of his own burning body. He screamed, silently. Nothing left in his throat to make sound. It went on and on, and he could feel the car, too, burning: the tires melting and smoking, oil exploding out the head gasket, fire flooding backward out the air-blower. Everything was in pain.

And then it stopped. Just fire, roaring up out of his core to fill every crevice of his body, rising to spill out inexhaustible through his mouth and the crown of his head: no breath, just this continuous, billowing pressure.

 **Hurts less when you're pissed off,** Robbie explained, as Jaime turned his hands over, staring down at them. The T-shirt and jeans he'd worn out to the car were replaced by seamless leather and kevlar, from his throat to his fingers and toes. There didn't seem to be a way to take any of it off. Jaime poked himself in the chest and felt the touch of his hand against the leather; he pushed in and the jumpsuit sank back until he bumped into one of his own ribs. Robbie's rib. The burning engine purred and howled, and Jaime felt the vibrations as though they were coming from his own heart.

_What—what the hell—_

**For our next trick,** Robbie said, and one of Robbie's hands moved without Jaime's input, adjusting the mirror. Jaime got a brief horrifying look at a burning steel skull-like thing with human teeth. He worked Robbie's jaw and confirmed that he had no tongue. Well. Robbie had warned him that their powered form wasn't human. **I want you to relax a little. _Be_ the car. We're gonna tamp everything down, hide the fires, and wait for him to show.**

_Be the car?_

**Just let yourself sink into the seat. Feel the sun on the roof, the weight on the shocks. Let the body go, we don't need it right now.**

_We don't?_

**Naw. It's ornamental. This car, now—this is real.**

Jaime did his best to sink into the seat and feel the car. It came...very easy. Almost too easy to lose track of his body in favor of the heat and wind against the black paint, the weight of his body compressing the upholstery, especially since Robbie's body, now that it had burned away to bare bone, felt mostly numb. _You're creeping me out._

**Get used to it.**

The next thing Jaime knew, the plates of the Roast Rider's steel skull sucked into the headrest like water into a sponge and the weight on the upholstery was gone. Robbie's body was gone. _Whoa! Whoa!_

 **Be the car.** The fires guttered out, the engine shut off, leaving Jaime in stillness and silence. Just the sun beating down, birds and traffic in the distance, the view of the empty street in the mirrors and windows. **Relax. Isn't this nice?**

_Dios! Donde estoy? No tengo cuerpo! No me gusta, Robbie, no puedo hacer nada—_

**This is where we wait. Trust me. Drift a little. It'll feel like...nothing. Hours can feel like seconds. Decades can pass. This is how you put the world on fast-forward.**

Jaime tried to relax, to be in the moment. It was too easy to drift off; time started to jerk on him.

Robbie's presence poked at him, where they overlapped and threaded through the steel of the car. **Hey, you're getting a little wobbly, kid. You want me to drive?**

_What, take your body back? You think you're strong enough to fight?_

**I've watched Eli do it enough times. I mean. Muscle memory.**

This was too weird; the Scarab was really weird, but he'd had months to get used to it, and this was weird on a whole other level. _Good idea._ The sun slipped away in the sky five degrees, and Jaime came back aware as a man and his pit bull wandered by. _I'll take over if you get tired._

**To take my life back—to get revenge for being locked out of my own body for over a year—somehow I'll find the strength.**

 

* * *

 

Robbie and the Rider faced off, the Rider whirling chains, Robbie pacing back and forth. His feet clanked over the pavement and the plates clicked and whispered with every movement. The armor chirped at him, built up the rocket boots again. “Take us up,” Robbie agreed. They shot up ten feet, batted away the Rider's chain when it lashed at them. Eli had the knives out, foot-long daggers whirling on each end of the chain. The armor took aim with a canon over Robbie's shoulder and fired.

The Rider vanished, along with a chunk of road you could lose a Volkswagen in. All that remained was a steaming crater.

“Fuck, Jaime,” Robbie gasped.

ϕ?

Below them, the Charger roared, jetting flames high enough to flow along the armor.

“He's okay,” Robbie breathed.

ϕ ջ ↈ? ϕ?

“You can't shoot that stuff off around here. People live here. People leave their cars here. They lose their car, they can't go to work; they can't go to work, _bad stuff happens._ So no disintegrator rays, or plasma beams—absolutely no military-grade weaponry in my neighborhood!”

֏ջϔϟԴ ↈ ₪ ϡՃϞ, ϕ?

“I don't know what you're saying.” The Rider flowed out through the roof of the car and slung out a hook at them, that chain shooting up shockingly fast. Caught Robbie by the horns of the armor, yanked, using the car for ballast. They hit the ground hard, cracking the pavement more. “Eventually the Rider gets tired,” Robbie panted, as the Charger took off down the road, dragging them behind. He fought to get the hook off the horn, but it was jammed on tight. Eli had the Rider's arm stuck halfway out through the door, driving with the other hand, cackling. Eli just loved road-hauling people. “We're gonna distract him so Eli can't hijack Jaime and take him on a rampage.”

ϕ?

“We're gonna not get killed. And when he wears himself out, I don't know, we'll just keep hitting him in the head over and over.” Robbie stopped fussing with the hook and grabbed the chain, hauled them hand-over-hand to the car. “Can you lift two tons?” he demanded as they skidded over the ground, striking sparks against the asphalt. “Get ready to fly for yes, make a weird noise for no.”

Wings and what felt like a jet turbine sprouted from the back of the armor. “Great. Here we go.” As the Charger zig-zagged across the road, Robbie reached out and grabbed the rear quarter-panel, slung himself under the bumper. He got a good hold of the frame. “Sorry,” he told the car. And then he braced his feet and lifted the blazing drive-wheels off the road.

The Rider's face reared up out of the sheet-metal and head-butted him. “Fuck,” he grunted. Suddenly his arms were six feet long, and he was out of Eli's immediate reach. “Take off, take off.” The jet turbine kicked on, a high-frequency vibration that made Robbie's gut churn. The wings flapped. Robbie struggled to keep his focus as his fingers, three feet away from his actual hands, reshaped themselves into clamps, as Eli hauled himself the rest of the way out of the Charger's steel panels, as his feet left the ground. They got lift-off, slowly and grudgingly. “Remember those mountains,” Robbie grunted. “Just outside the city, the national park? Just rocks and trees?” Eli grabbed Robbie's armored forearms and climbed him like a fire-pole. Stabbed at his eyes with a knife. Robbie ducked his head to the side and the armor bulked up into a helmet.

Eli's knife became a pry-bar. He worked it under the horns of the power-pack attached to Robbie's torso.

The armor started freaking out. ԲփϛՀ! ԲփϛՀ! The forbidden particle-cannons and plasma-beams sprouted out of every limb that wasn't currently occupied, mainly Robbie's legs and the back of his head, and they all pointed at Eli and fired off at once. Eli soaked up the damage, chuckled and kept working on the power pack. Ͽ҂Ѧ! Something gave way in the armor, part of the big horn thing coming loose, and when Eli snuck the crowbar an inch deeper and gave it another shove, Robbie's back seized up in agony—not the armor, his real back, Jaime's back, deep inside. He couldn't feel his legs. “Fucker,” Robbie choked.

The armor retracted his arms and made him drop the car, then started corkscrewing through the air, jerking and flopping chaotically, trying to throw Eli off. In desperation, the armor dove for the ground, hit at two hundred miles an hour, letting Eli take the brunt of the drop. Scraped Eli right off against the asphalt.

Robbie shoved himself up with shaking arms. Eli was stalking closer, the Charger roaring to meet them. His legs were still numb. He waited until he heard the Charger just a hundred yards behind him, far too close for it to stop or turn at the pace it liked to keep, and then reached for Eli's neck. The armor got the idea and shot his arm out twenty feet, a snare. He hauled Eli in close and bashed him in the face with a weighted fist, waiting to feed him to the damn car.

The Charger caught Robbie full on his back and sent him flying across the block. It passed right through Eli.

Right.

Robbie wasn't part of the car anymore.

He spat gravel and blood and rolled himself over. His back hurt slightly less, but his legs were still numb. “Armor, fly me over there so I can hit him, please,” he said.

ϕ? ՌꝎ! The armor remained land-bound.

“Please, let me hit him!”

ՌꝎ, ϕ!

And Eli gunned the Charger, lassoed him with a chain, and started road-hauling him again.

 

* * *

 

 _Robbie, do you want some help?_ Jaime asked, perched half in the Rider's body, half in the car, watching the chained-up Beetle armor tumble helplessly across the asphalt in the mirrors.

 **This is going great,** Robbie said. **Sit back and relax.**

 _We're in the middle of a residential area,_ Jaime insisted. _The car could've killed somebody when Eli dropped it, and he could've destroyed a water main with that particle canon. We've got to get somewhere less populated!_

 **No can do,** Robbie replied, giving the chain a playful yank that sent Eli skidding back and forth over the ground. **He's holding back, for whatever reason. And the only way we're gonna keep beating him, is if he _keeps holding back._ We control the initiative, we control the environment, that's how we win. Now I just need him to hold still for a minute while I get back to work ripping that battery out of him—**

 _I think living with a serial killer in your head for a year messed you up, man,_ Jaime said sympathetically. He settled himself in the Rider's body, concentrating on its sensations, cutting himself off from the car. _I'll take it from here._

**What?**

Just like the early days, when he'd had to force his will on the Scarab, he dug deep and concentrated on moving his body where he wanted it to go. Stiff at first, Robbie holding tight to posture and motion, and then suddenly yielding all at once.

**No! No! What the fuck!**

_I'll give it back when we subdue him,_ Jaime said. _I want to try something real quick. Then if we **do** have to destroy my body—70/30, right? I promise. This is just for the rest of this fight. _ And Jaime stomped on the gas pedal and streaked toward the freeway. _Crap, it's rush hour. How do I get out of town?_

Silence. Struggling in the back of his head.

_Robbie? I don't know my way around here!_

As the Charger slowed, caught in traffic like any mortal car, Eli hauled himself hand-over-hand back up the chain toward the back bumper. Jaime felt him grab onto one of the quarter-panels again and start dragging himself, foot by foot, along the passenger-side running board. He didn't know what to do. There were cars everywhere. If he could get to a gap in traffic, he could scrape Eli off against the concrete barrier; as it was, the best he might do was distract him until they made it out of town. An armored hand punched through the passenger window. The Beetle ripped the door open, hauled his torso up with dead legs dragging, and collapsed into the front seat. Behind the blue-and-black mask of the armor, Eli Morrow bared Jaime's teeth in a terrible snarl. No weapons formed on his fists. He wriggled further into the car, seized Jaime by the shoulder with one hand, and started punching with the other, screaming incoherently.

Jaime soaked up the blows. They hurt less than getting hit in the Beetle armor, but they still disoriented him, and he _had to keep driving,_ had to keep their burning death-machine from riding up on the car in front of them or wandering into the wrong lane. He did his best to block Eli's punches with his right arm.

Eli stopped screaming and started bellowing, hoarse and cracked through Jaime's throat. “You fucker! You bastard! This's for Mom! This for Gabe! For Gabe, you fucker! For Mom and Dad, I know it was you, everything's because of you! You bastard motherfucker!”

That...did not make sense.

Jaime struggled to concentrate, drive, and roll with the punches at the same time. _How do I talk?_ he asked Robbie.

Silence.

_Digame! I know Eli hurt you, but what if that's not him?_

Jaime opened his mouth and just tried talking. “Kaji-Dah,” he called. The voice came out strange, like what you'd get if you ran engine noise through a talk-box, but it got the point across.

The Beetle armor froze. Jaime turned his head to the side and chanced a look. Jaime's real face was still contorted in rage, but the armor wasn't letting him move anymore.

“Kaji-Dah, it's me,” Jaime said. “I know I look a bit different—”

The armor hugged him, pressing Jaime's face hard against the Rider's leather chest, and muffling a cry of frustration from whoever was inside.

“Whoa, that's hot, that won't feel nice, that's my body in there still,” Jaime said, pushing the armor away. The armor complied, settling back in the passenger seat as the car healed itself around them.

Jaime's real eyes narrowed and whoever was behind them stopped screaming curses. “Did you listen to the voice in my head,” they demanded flatly.

“Um.” Jaime was suddenly glad he had no face to look embarrassed with.

“What'd he tell you.”

Jaime kept driving, jumped and gasped a fiery gasp as someone cut him off and he almost rear-ended them. He had to hand it to LA traffic—fearless drivers.

“Take the next exit and get back on heading East,” the person in Jaime's body ordered. “We're gonna be late for Gabe's bus.”

“ _You're_ Robbie Reyes,” Jaime groaned, rolling nonexistent eyes. “I feel like such an idiot.”

“As opposed to who?” Robbie demanded, beside him, wearing Jaime's body.

“Some serial killer. I, uh, I don't know why I thought that—”

Robbie lowered Jaime's head into armored hands. “Fucking Eli.”

 

* * *

 

They took the next exit and Robbie walked Jaime through the powering-down process for the Roast Rider, which was pretty much, “start paying attention to how tired you are, and then suddenly your flesh congeals back around you, which hurts like hell until your bones cool down and you stop burning yourself alive, then you're just disgustingly sweaty and dehydrated. Now drive home.” Robbie stayed in the armor, because Jaime's spine still needed a few minutes to heal and de-Beetling took a bit longer than de-Roasting.

They made it back to Hillrock Lane, parked opposite the crater in the street. Checked up and down the road and hustled Robbie inside when no one was looking.

“Okay,” Jaime said as he shut the door behind him. They had eleven minutes before Gabe was supposed to get home. “Taking off the bug-suit. It might hurt really bad. It used to for me. It's 'cause growing the skin back lags behind the armor coming off, and the Scarab had to figure out how to shut down my pain pathways with practice. So it might be fine, but it might feel—kinda like what you're used to, but slower. Oh, and Escarabajo—can you make Robbie some clothes, please? Just, the same as whatever he had on.”

The armor's yellow eyes stared at Jaime as he fussed around, laying out a fuzzy blanket on the couch. Jaime's body was taller than Robbie's. This could have boosted Jaime's confidence, if he'd been in it. “Just tell me how to take it off.”

Jaime shrugged. “Ask.”

Robbie lowered Jaime's head and shut Jaime's eyes. “Armor, please shut down.”

The suit gave a compliant little click that Jaime wished he could hear the words to, and then the plating started to dissolve away in great blotches, leaving bands of raw muscle swiftly swallowed up in new skin. Jaime had never had the chance to see this from the outside before. It was like a gruesome anatomy drawing, but wet and alive, red and silvery bands twitching and shuddering as Robbie bent double and braced himself on the coffee table, panting through clenched teeth. A pair of shirts and some jeans extruded out of the armor as it sank away, wrapping around Jaime's body but not before he'd had to avert his eyes from his own bare ass.

“Thank-you, armor,” Robbie said. He sank down on the couch. “You were right. That hurt.” He stared straight at the opposite wall, dead-eyed. Jaime stared surreptitiously. It wasn't at all like looking in a mirror, more like looking at a stranger, a second-cousin he hadn't met before. Was he really that bony? Maybe he should give up and shave off his attempt at a beard, try growing it again in two years. He looked very young and very tired.

“Hey,” Jaime said, reaching out for his shoulder. Robbie looked at his hand, then up at him, and Jaime slowly drew back. “You want some hot chocolate or something? I think I saw some in your pantry—”

“That's Gabe's,” Robbie said.

“Well. Can I have some? It's been...kind of a stressful day.”

“Fine.” Robbie shook Jaime's head hard, pushed Jaime's hair out of his eyes. “You know, let's both have some. Your blood sugar's probably low, and if you pass out, Eli's gonna steal your body again and we can't have that.” He lurched to his feet, staggered a bit like Jaime's back wasn't quite healed up yet.

“Wow,” Jaime said, squinting at him. “Anything else I should know? If I say Dracula three times do I turn into a man-eating bat? Is there a bomb in my chest? Does your weird eye shoot cosmic rays at people?”

“A heads-up from you would've been nice, too,” Robbie snapped, pulling mismatched mugs out of a cupboard and slapping them roughly on the counter. “And how hard can it be to ignore the crazy asshole living in the back of your brain? Just eat, sleep, don't let him talk you into murdering anyone. It's not that difficult.”

“I'm sorry,” Jaime said, lowering his head. “I should've seen through it. But he said he was you, he had this whole sad story that you—Eli—whoever—had taken over his body—”

“ _Of course he—_ sorry. That wasn't fair of me. I know how Eli is.” He loaded up the mugs with water and cocoa mix, stirred them a bit, and microwaved them. They sat awkwardly at the kitchen table sipping somewhat lukewarm hot cocoa, until Robbie perked up like a dog. “Bus.” He shooed Jaime out of the kitchen and herded him out the door.

“Wait, you come, too,” Jaime protested as Robbie stopped at the threshold of the apartment. “He's _your_ brother—I don't even know him!”

They waited on the sidewalk, Robbie waiting behind Jaime and scanning up and down the road while the bus went through its routine of kneeling hydraulics, unfolding the lift, fastening, lowering, and unfastening Gabe Reyes and his power-chair. “Hi, Robbie!” Gabe called, waving vigorously.

“Say hey, buddy,” Robbie muttered.

“Hey, buddy,” Jaime called back. He looked over his shoulder. “I can't just _be you,_ come on.”

Gabe twisted the joystick for the power chair and buzzed over to them. “Who's this guy, Robbie?”

Robbie pushed past Jaime. “This is your cous—uh—”

“This is your cousin Jaime from Texas,” Jaime interrupted. “Jaime knows _all about you,_ because we've been emailing and talking on the phone, he loves you and he thinks you're great.”

Gabe squinted at Robbie in Jaime's body, whose face was frozen in an awkward rictus. “Are you a doctor?”

Robbie made a wounded noise.

“No, he's just your cousin, family, like another brother.”

“I'll draw you a chart,” Robbie said weakly.

“Okay, Jaime,” Gabe said, and they wheeled inside. “But Robbie needs to look at it, to be sure you did it right. Sometimes people make mistakes.”

Jaime looked at Robbie curiously.

“One time his take-home worksheet had a typo,” Robbie explained.

“He still gets homework—wow, no fair.” He watched as Robbie cut in front of him and helped Gabe bump his chair up over the apartment's threshold. “So, like a spelling error, or—”

“Math error.”

Jaime trailed behind as Gabe wheeled inside. “I want to play Crash Bandicoot,” Gabe announced.

“Homework first,” Robbie hissed.

“Homework first,” Jaime echoed. “Hey, your cousin Jaime's really smart. I bet he would love to help you with your homework.”

“I don't need _help_ ,” Gabe protested, suddenly sour. “It's not _hard._ ”

“I've still got to draw you that chart like I promised, buddy,” Robbie said.

“Oh,” said Gabe, looking at Robbie again. Then he gave Jaime a searching look.

“Yeah, he's got to draw you that chart,” Jaime agreed. Then he ran and hid in the kitchen.

Out in the living room, Robbie abruptly transformed into a kind, happy, patient, and affectionate person. He and Gabe messed around with pen and paper for a bit, drawing the imaginary family tree that connected them to Jaime. Jaime pretended to check them for errors, then Robbie drew more family trees for demonstration, this time of fictional superheroes, then Gabe buzzed into his bedroom so he could show “Jaime” all his comic books, and then they read comics and played with action figures for an hour until Gabe broke off and asked to play Crash Bandicoot again. Then “Robbie” had to remind him about his homework. Gabe sulked for a solid five minutes before giving in and filling out worksheets, recruiting Jaime to proofread everything before he started writing.

He was a nice kid. Teenager, but a nice kid.

Homework done, Gabe parked his chair in front of the TV and transferred himself to the couch, got the ancient Playstation fired up, and settled in to steer Crash around and around an abandoned mine. Robbie joined Jaime in the kitchen. “Where were you?”

“You guys seemed fine,” Jaime protested.

“Yeah—for now.” Robbie got a pot of water boiling, added a box of generic macaroni and cheese, the stuff with the yellow powder in the foil packet. When the noodles were done, he added butter and frozen peas and three thinly sliced hot dogs along with the synthetic cheese. Jaime watched in fascination and vague horror. Robbie glared at him and he looked at his feet.

“We'll get this fixed. I know a lot of really, really smart people. And some magic users. Now that I have my contacts list back.”

“I know a guy who thinks he's smart, too,” Robbie said, carrying the pot of macaroni to the table. “Thing about smart guys, is they're better at creating problems than solving them.” He set out spoons and glasses, filled the glasses two-thirds full with water from the sink, took the Batman cup into the bathroom and returned with pills.

“Hey. Try a little optimism.”

Robbie shrugged, got a ladle and stuck it in the pot as a serving spoon. “Gabe! Time for dinner. It's mac'n'cheese!”

“I'm almost done with this level!” Gabe protested.

Robbie blinked at him, opened his mouth. Then he looked at Jaime. “Tell him to pause the level.”

“Pause the level, Gabe,” Jaime told him.

“Say please,” Robbie hissed.

“Please.”

Gabe trundled Crash along the train-track a few hundred yards, while Robbie chewed on Jaime's lip. Then Gabe paused the game. “Okay, Robbie.” He pushed himself up off the couch and surfed to the chair, legs held a bit stiff and bent in. Then he buzzed over to the table. “Mac'n'cheese? Mac'n'cheese is my favorite, Robbie! I love mac'n'cheese!”

“Jaime made it,” Jaime said.

“Thank-you, Jaime! I love mac'n'cheese!”

Jaime's parents would have slowed down enough to bless the food, but at Robbie's house they just dug in.

Off-brand macaroni and cheese with peas and hot dogs was actually pretty good. Jaime went to grab seconds for himself—he was starving—but Robbie kicked him under the table. “What?” he hissed.

“It's the end of the month. Food has to last.”

“ _What?_ ”

“End of the month. Payday's next week. Racing's been slow.”

“What about that wad of cash in your sock drawer?” Jaime whispered.

“That's my front money. You can't enter a race without front money.”

“Oh my god. What's the matter with you?” Jaime waved at Gabe, who had managed to spread comics and action figures all over his end of the table and was reading while he ate. “You've got people depending on you, man!”

Robbie said something inaudible through clenched teeth.

“What?”

“I cheat,” Robbie repeated. “I cheat. At car races. For money.”

“Oh, okay,” Jaime said. He stared around at the shabby little apartment, the happy kid across the table, then back at Robbie. “I guess that's...fine?”

 **He is a mercenary coward who never lifts a finger to combat evil unless I drive him to,** the voice in Robbie's brain sniped. Cold and sneering and Midwestern. Not pretending to be friendly at all.

Jaime startled and sat straight up in his chair. “Whoa.”

“He talking to you?” Robbie murmured.

Jaime nodded.

“Just blow him off.” As Jaime watched, Robbie scowled down at his empty bowl, then smiled slightly, sighed, stood up, and washed it in the sink.

**A world of human refuse, choking the streets. Here comes Eli with the flamethrower. And what does the worthless boy do with it? _As little as he possibly can._ He _tenderizes_ the garbage. He smacks it around a little. It's like pulling teeth to get him out the door—**

Jaime shook his head and covered his ears. It didn't block out the serial killer's ranting.

Robbie left the kitchen and disappeared down the hall.

“Where are you going?” Jaime demanded, starting to panic.

“I'm taking a nap.”

 _Don't leave me alone,_ Jaime almost said, as Robbie's bedroom door opened and shut.

**But you're not alone. Jaime Reyes.**

 

* * *

 

Robbie's attempt at a nap lasted about five minutes before he realized the guilt wouldn't let him sleep. He padded back into the living room to find Jaime standing in the kitchen, scrubbing the pasta pot furiously.

ϕ! Ռ ԻѪϭϮ Պ ϯϿԺ! chirped the voice in his head.

 _I know, I know. It's your human._ “Hey,” he said, and Jaime dropped the pot in the sink and spun around.

“You're back,” Jaime said, wild-eyed.

Robbie looked himself over. He looked exhausted, bags under his eyes. His hair needed another trim and Jaime hadn't shaved that morning. From a distance, the weird scars on his head and mismatched eyes didn't look _that_ unnatural—not compared to some body-mods he'd seen—and he looked oddly small and young. Must be the way Jaime stood in his body. “He's still bothering you, isn't he.”

“I'm ignoring him.” As Jaime finished speaking, he twitched and shook his head violently.

Robbie sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “You want to look at hot-rod parts on Ebay? That usually distracts him.”

“I really want to call my dad,” Jaime said.

Robbie winced. “I think your phone got vaporized when the armor turned on.”

Ꝏ ζ֏≈ ջϔϟԴ₪ ϗ: ϧϚՀϡՃϞքϛ. Robbie's vision went blue yet again, and he heard a—a dial tone from nowhere. “Whoa, wait,” he said. “Jaime, I think it's trying to make a call. What do I do?”

Jaime looked just as startled. “Um. I don't think the Scarab does conference calls.”

“It's ringing,” Robbie said grimly.

Jaime smacked himself in the forehead. “Get your phone. Hold your phone in your hand.”

Robbie felt his boxers for pockets and found none. He jogged down the hallway to his room where his pants were. A man's voice interrupted him. Texican accent. _“Hello?”_

“Uh,” Robbie said. He shook out his pants, but they weren't his pants, they were Jaime's pants that the armor had made, and his phone wasn't there. “Hello. Mr. Reyes?”

“ _I see you're calling me from Jaime's body,”_ the man said.

“Uh...yes, sir.”

Jaime caught up to him and dashed inside the door; he had Robbie's phone in his hand because he was wearing Robbie's pants. “Hold the phone in your hand,” Jaime repeated, passing it over.

“ _Is there a reason you used my son's body to commit grand theft auto and assault a highway patrolman?”_

“...Uh...” He waved the phone at Jaime, mouthed, _now what._

“Scarab, can you hook up to the phone so I can talk to Dad?”

Black plates oozed and melted over Robbie's hand, sprouted tentacles out of his fingers and turned the tips of the tentacles into micro-USB jacks. He yelped and tried to shake the phone off his hand by reflex, but the tentacles plugged into the phone and didn't let go.

“Don't act like that's so freaky. Your body absorbs into your car,” Jaime said. “Dad? You're on speaker.”

“ _Mijo? That you?”_ Mr. Reyes' voice now came in stereo, from inside Robbie's head and also, at a slight delay and in poorer quality, through Robbie's phone.

Jaime grabbed Robbie's forearm and leaned in. “It's me! Dad. Did you get my messages? This is going to sound completely crazy—”

“ _You switched bodies with a total stranger overnight for no reason, I know. You start doing a California accent out of nowhere, run from Paco like he was going to eat you, treat your sister like a civilized human being, it was obvious in hindsight. You want to talk to your big brother?”_

“Go ahead,” Robbie said.

Jaime interrupted him. “No, Dad, it's not a big brother situation. Robbie's cool. I'm fine.”

“ _Are you sure? He's very concerned.”_

“Scarab, can you send Dad a picture? Robbie, look at me for a second.”

Robbie looked up at his own body and felt a weird twinge behind his eyes, saw crosshairs and boxes blink across his vision. “Uh.”

“ _Who's that? Is that you?”_

“Let me just take a selfie,” Robbie said. He held the phone out and Jaime crowded in beside him. Then the camera app turned itself on without his input and the selfie flashed across his brain before firing off over the cell signal.

“See, we're fine, Dad. I woke up in Los Angeles.”

“ _Hollywood?”_ demanded a new, shriller voice.

“Uh...sure, Milagro. I'm not buying you souvenirs, so don't ask.”

“ _Jaime, stop,”_ Mr. Reyes grunted. _“You're still switched? You—Robbie, right?—you took the opportunity to fight a supervillain while wearing my son?”_

“Uh...” Robbie said.

“That was actually my fault,” Jaime said. “It's complicated. Dad, what do you mean, it's all over the news? How'd they find out? Are they tracking Blue Beetle?”

“ _They noticed when he assaulted a highway patrolman and showed up in California, but it's not just you. It's thousands of people, apparently random. Your super-friends called us; they say they already have a plan to smooth over all the crimes people have been committing in each-other's bodies, gracias a Dios, which should be an easy sell after the Secretary of Defense attacked half the Presidential Cabinet with a desk lamp.”_

“Oh, no,” Jaime said.

“ _He put ten people in the hospital before he had a heart attack.”_

“Oh, no.”

“ _According to your super-friends, Doctor Strange and Doctor Fate got on the case right from the start and they're close to a solution. You two, just sit tight and stop looking for supervillains.”_

Robbie squinted at the phone. “Did those guys _cause_ the body-swapping?”

Mr. Reyes paused. _“That's a very good question, son. I mean, Robbie. Almost as good a question as, why did you feel the need to steal a car and my credit card, instead of asking for a plane ticket.”_

“Uh...” Robbie rubbed his free hand through Jaime's hair and tugged on his scalp. “I...”

“He was worried about his brother,” Jaime supplied. “He probably wasn't thinking clearly.”

“Yeah,” Robbie said. “And when I was getting arrested—I think the armor has automated defenses? I didn't mean to attack that cop, it just happened.”

Jaime raised one eyebrow and shook his head slowly, suddenly stern and intimidating. Robbie had never really noticed how thick his eyebrows were. _All you,_ Jaime mouthed.

“Your credit card burned up,” Robbie said. “I can't use it anymore, don't worry.”

“ _Well, luckily, Jaime doesn't need my credit card to get home,”_ Mr. Reyes said. _“Mijo, your mother wants to talk to you.”_

“Oh,” said Robbie, wishing he could unstick the phone from his hand and leave Jaime in privacy.

“ _Jaime?”_ Mrs. Reyes now.

“Mom! Hey. I'm fine! I'm in California.”

“ _I heard. How about your body, is your body also okay?”_

“How's your back?” Jaime asked Robbie.

“Fine.”

“We're both fine. There was...a misunderstanding, but we figured it out.”

“ _Sí, sí. I'd hoped the 'serial killer' part was an exaggeration.”_

“Um...yeah. Robbie doesn't kill people.”

Robbie looked up at the ceiling so Jaime couldn't read his face.

“ _He's a lot younger than I expected, from when he was pretending to be you.”_

“I'm nineteen,” Robbie said defensively. “I've got a good job and my own place and everything.”

“ _I didn't mean anything by it,”_ Mrs. Reyes assured him gently. _“Just—you seem very mature.”_

“ _Cagey,”_ said Mr. Reyes in the background.

“ _Mature for your age. It's a compliment.”_

Robbie didn't need compliments. “Any idea when the magic people get this sorted out so I don't get fired and Jaime can go home?”

“ _They say probably tonight. Right? Tonight. Jaime, you are going to memorize my and your father's cell numbers when you get back. Don't think I won't quiz you. You're sixteen, this is ridiculous.”_

After Jaime finished talking with his parents, instead of browsing Ebay for exhaust systems and camshafts to make Eli shut up, they called more of Jaime's friends. Turned out the muscle-bound cholo who'd chased Robbie across the parking lot was actually Jaime's closest buddy, Paco, a crude and sarcastic teddy-bear. He and Jaime's other best buddy, Brenda, who was even more sarcastic, teased and sniped at each-other and at Jaime for almost an hour. Robbie could see Jaime relax at their jokes, see the tension and head-twitching fade. Then they called one of Jaime's super-friends, a serious young man about Robbie's age, to check in and assure him that the Beetle armor hadn't been hijacked by a serial killer and that the supervillain in Los Angeles was handled.

“See, he's not really a supervillain,” Jaime said.

“I don't know what he is, he's sure not a hero and you can't trust him,” Robbie interrupted. “But he's not actively trying to level the city, no.”

“ _How do you know this about La Leyenda?”_ the young man asked. It sounded like he was taking notes in the background.

“Rumors? I live here, everyone knows this stuff.”

When they ran out of people to call, it was time to detach the phone from Jaime's hand and put Gabe to bed. That usually meant time for Robbie to get in the car, burn up, and find someone for Eli to beat on. Instead he sat Jaime down on the couch and put on Antiques Roadshow, his favorite torturing-Eli material. It combined three things Eli hated most, besides people in general: tacky knick-knacks, non-violence, and inflation. It was easier to tune out what Eli was saying when you were trying to guess the value on an ugly vase, and it was a good way to get Eli on a passionate rant about something other than murder.

Jaime leaned on him as the night wore on. Robbie almost put his arm around his shoulder, like he would with Gabe, but stopped himself. He didn't even know Jaime. Technically it would be giving himself a hug. It would be weird.

Վ≈Թ Ѧ! the armor alerted him. Ѧ! Ѧ! ՃϟՊϿ Ѧ₪ↂ ϕ!

“Something's happening,” Robbie started to say, and then the world blinked, he found himself sitting crosslegged on the couch and leaning against a tall, bony teenager, and Eli was saying, — **the shit people hang onto, it's pathological. Weighing you down! And it's reality TV like this—they cherry-pick for these episodes, boy, they gotta select that perfect ratio of junk to diamonds, make it look like everybody's 'bout to win the lottery, that's what keeps the sheep watching: hope! Look at that doll, it's like a class project from little Gabbie's development center. Can you imagine keeping that shit in your house? Long enough for it to appreciate? If that does turn out to be, what, ten grand in 2018 dollars, who-the-fuck prices these things, even then you'd've** _ **more**_ **than paid for it by the cost of** _ **looking**_ **at the abomination all those years! My god—**

"Yeah, I missed you, too," Jaime said into thin air. "Hey **—** "

Robbie kept very still in his head and held up one hand to Jaime to be quiet. Just for another minute. Sure, Eli was still talking, but until he noticed that Robbie was back, he wasn't talking _to him._

Eli paused when Robbie's phone got a text from an unknown number. Robbie looked over as Jaime held it up.

 _[An attempt has been made to correct the anomaly you may have experienced today,]_ it read.  [ _Please reply to this message if you continue to experience an anomaly.]_

 **Oh, you're back,** Eli said. **About that business earlier today—**

 _It's not like I expected better,_ Robbie replied sourly. “He noticed,” he told Jaime. “You can talk.”

**I was going to say, it doesn't affect our deal.**

_I'm keeping our deal just fine,_ Robbie growled in his head. _I haven't found anyone yet._

**You're not even looking.**

_You weren't paying attention when you made the deal._ Robbie's phone beeped again and Jaime passed it over.

_[Please be advised that we will not attempt correction of any monetary damages or injuries to person or reputation that occurred as a result of this anomaly. We recommend contacting your relevant insurance companies and law enforcement agencies.]_

He showed the text to Jaime. “Looks like lots of people came off worse than us.”

“You committed a felony in my body,” Jaime reminded him.

Robbie winced. “I'm sorry. I had to get to Gabe and I didn't know about the suit.”

“Still. That wasn't called for.”

“You're right. I'm sorry.”

Another text.

_[We are pleased to report that our attempt to correct the anomaly was successful. Further corrections will increase the risk of further anomalies. Do not text this number unless you still perceive yourself to be “in the wrong body.”]_

_[We mean “in the wrong body” in the literal sense, not sensations of dysmorphia]_

_[We repeat, donut text this number unless u r STILL IN WRONG BODY LITERALLY]_

Robbie blocked the number. “Thank god that's over. Canelo's gonna try to short me again, the shop doesn't really do sick days.”

“Isn't that illegal?”

“So's hiring minors and dumping hazardous waste in the landfill.”

“Hey, Robbie,” Jaime said seriously, gripping Robbie's shoulder the way Robbie couldn't bring himself to do earlier, “If you and Gabe ever come by El Paso—I know it's a long way, but if you, like, move—my dad can always use some good guys at the shop. I mean, I assume you know what you're doing—”

“Employee of the month three months running,” said Robbie smugly. He frowned. He wished he could visit El Paso, stare off into the middle distance while Jaime bothered his sister and joked with his friends, join them at the Reyes' kitchen table to eat the kind of food his mom used to make and that he didn't know how to. “I don't think you want me and Eli near your family.”

Jaime stared at him like he was an idiot. “Gabe lives with you.”

Robbie felt the cold lightening that flooded him every time he thought about the fact that Gabe technically lived with Eli. He nodded.

“Don't sell yourself short. Like you told me. Just blow him off. Eat, sleep, hydrate. It's not that complicated.”

**Don't listen to him. He can't understand what I put you through.**

_He literally just experienced it, dumbass._ “You know, I think I could...hop over, while Gabe is at school some time,” Robbie said. “The car can.”

“Or call. Don't set yourself on fire on my account,” Jaime said. “You know, it's probably easier if I visit.”

“Yeah.” Robbie scowled at him. “Gabe's gonna want to play superheroes with his Cousin Jaime. You better deliver.”

“Rrrright, okay,” Jaime said. “I guess I'll...go. Mom and Dad still worry, and it's late.”

“I'll walk you out.” Robbie got up, led Jaime out to the threshold of the apartment building, peered through the window of the exterior door, and looked up and down the street before waving Jaime outside. “All clear. Go ahead.”

“Shouldn't I walk around the block? So your secret identity doesn't get connected to the Blue Beetle?”

Robbie snorted. “No. It's after dark. People know better than to look out the windows at weird shit around here. Go. Fly. Be free.”

“You're kind of a dick,” Jaime grinned. He fired up the armor, and Robbie watched as alien metal crawled and flowed and wrapped over his limbs, smooth and quick and not apparently painful at all. When it closed over his face, it looked black and featureless in the dim streetlights, except for the glowing yellow eyes. “I'm serious about keeping in touch, Robbie. The more other heroes you know, the better. Family, too. I'll ask around; maybe we are cousins.”

“Maybe,” Robbie said wistfully.

Jaime extruded big translucent yellow insect wings out of the armor, and a jet-pack to go with them, and took off. He waved; Robbie waved back. The glow of the jetpack was soft and vanished into the sky almost immediately—or maybe that was just how fast Jaime was moving.

He padded back inside and saved Jaime's phone number to his contacts list. Then he remembered that the armor had vaporized Jaime's phone. Shit. He stood there in the living room for a minute, staring stupidly down at his calls-received list.

**Aw, don't be too broken up over it, kid. You've still got me.**

He flicked back to the sent calls list and saw an unfamiliar area code right at the top. _Bingo,_ he thought, and saved the number for Jaime's dad's auto shop. _Okay, Eli._

**We finally gonna kick some ass tonight? You lazy punk?**

_The coyotes who left their people to cook in that semi-truck that was on the news. Think you can sniff 'em out?_

**It hurts me that you have to ask. You finally gonna kill 'em?**

_They'll never drive a semi-truck again, how about that._

**Spoken just like a supervillain. Let's roll.**

Robbie threw on his clothes, grabbed his keys, and headed out.

 

**Author's Note:**

> For those of you cursed with an interest in US politics, yes, that was Frank Castle in the body of US Secretary of Defense General James Mattis who put half the US Cabinet in the hospital. 
> 
> For those of you who like symbols, here is a key to the few symbols that I actually assigned meanings to:
> 
> Ꝏ = comply  
> ↂ = objective, goal, target  
> ↈ = priority target, extreme threat  
> ϕ = Jaime Reyes  
> Ѧ = magic  
> ՌꝎ = Noooo!  
> ԲփϛՀ = fuck


End file.
